Culture

What do you get when you combine an impressive minimum-wage increase with restaurateurs who aren’t sure how they’ll afford it and a dining population that won’t settle for second-rate products or services? Speculation on a long timeline.
The Seattle City Council’s recent decision to implement a $15 an hour minimum wage hike across all industries has been a real a head-scratcher for many restaurant owners trying to figure out how to deal with front of house employees who already average $35 an hour with cooks and dishwashers who are lucky to make $10 an hour.

According to a post by user Sporangepeeler on Reddit this morning, a fellow passenger on Metro bus 66 stepped in to prevent a mugging before it started. The situation occured this morning while he was riding the 66 Metro bus with his wife. Metro route 66 runs from the Northgate Transit Center, through the University District and into downtown. See below for the details on the event:

Must PressThe Wayzgoose Steamroller Smackdown at SLU Block PartyFriday (August 8, 12 to 6 p.m.) — Twelve teams compete, using a two-ton steamroller to print large-scale posters within a one-hour time limit. See this impressive (get it?) letterpress-printing spectacle at the South Lake Union Block Party this weekend.

In 1964, The Beatles arrived in New York to embark upon their first U.S. tour and changed the course of American popular music. The nation had just mourned the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and people were trying to make sense of it all. The impact of “Beatlemania” on the U.S. was remarkable.
More importantly to us locals, the third stop on the Beatles' tour was our own fair city of Seattle. On August 21, 1964 when no other Seattle hotel was ready to take them in, the Edgewater Hotel welcomed the fab four with open arms--and a few fishing poles!

Set your TiVos: body painting genius Dutch Bihary (straight outta Mount Vernon) is set to wow the world with his signature style and epic masterpieces using the naked body as his canvas on Skin Wars on GSN (formerly known as Game show Network) starting Wednesday, August 6.

If you’ve never seen the Steamroller Smackdown run by the School of Visual Concepts, you’ve been missing out. Lucky for you, though, it’s that time of year again for its annual Wayzgoose letterpress celebration (now in its 13th year), when teams use a two-ton steamroller to compete against one another and print large-scale posters that are then judged for best design. “We’re looking for the team with the coolest poster overall,” says SVC letterpress studio founder and manager Jenny Wilkson.

On Saturday August 2, rapper 50 Cent was in town to greet more than 500 people at the downtown Nordstrom flagship store for the debut of his new Studio Mastered Sound (SMS) headphones. He signed autographs and took photos with about 250 fans that snagged his new merch. As the crowd swelled in anticipation of his arrival--camera phones primed and ready--I had the incredible privilege of interviewing him to talk about his involvement with SMS Audio. Here are the highlights of our discussion:

It’s called a parklet and it’s got some people confused. Jennifer Wieland, public space program manager at SDOT, attributes the confusion to a misunderstanding of what parklets actually are. “They’re small public spaces that fit in easily with the urban landscape and are designed to have a very small impact on the streetscape.”

Is it rainy? Is it sunny? Today just can't seem to make up its mind. But this week, our dear readers weren't waffling on what stories they wanted to read. And read again. From a wildly delicious berry-laden recipe and four refreshing bevs to drink while you're out and about to one impressive 94-year-old baseball player who returned to Seattle, these are the seven top stories from the week.
Did you miss one? Read on.

I’ve known Herb Simpson for several years now, but in general whenever I’ve seen him, it’s been at his house in the Algiers section of his hometown New Orleans. (He bought that house about 60 years ago soon after returning from World War II, and has lived in it ever since.) So I’ve never really had a chance to see him in action.

Must Get NostalgicThrowback with Vintage Seafair Photos(8/2 to 8/3, times vary) — Seattle's events-filled summer festival culminates this weekend with the Blue Angels air show, hydroplane boat races along Lake Washington, SalmonFest and plenty more to keep you busy. In the spirit of Throwback Thursday, we dove into the Seattle Municipal Archives to find some vintage snapshots from Seafairs past.

Seattle's famous weeks-long, events-filled summer festival culminates this weekend with the Blue Angels air show (yes, they're back!), hydroplane boat races along Lake Washington, SalmonFest and plenty more activities to keep you busy. With the F/A-18 Hornets roaring overhead already, and in the spirit of the ever-nostalgic Throwback Thursday, we dove into the Seattle Municipal Archives to find some very vintage and way cool snapshots from Seafairs past.

In 2012, then Seattle-based graphic designer Dave Battjes set a design challenge for himself to create a logo for every one of the more than 400 parks in the city of Seattle—at the ambitious rate of one a day. “Most of Seattle’s parks have interesting beginnings or rich histories tying them to the Olmsted brothers or trolley systems. Some even have early settler roots,” says Battjes, who has lived in Greenwood, Belltown and Capitol Hill.

You’ve seen them popping up all over Seattle: they look like elaborate birdhouses or mailboxes, but instead of housing birdseed or ads—thankfully!—they’re filled with books. Books! For free! The small-scale, outdoor book shelters (see our March 2014 roundup of these literary wonders here) are called Little Free Libraries and they’re aimed at promoting community and literacy around the city.